When the Student is Ready
David Freund, Chief Leadership Officer

Last week, I mentioned one of my favorite sayings on the podcast, “When the student is ready, the teacher appears.” I also reminded everyone that my word for 2022 is Opportunity, so I wasn’t at all surprised when last week’s episode of one of my favorite podcasts was on the Nine Essentials of Opportunity. Was I ready, or was it the Law of Attraction? It really doesn’t matter to me; I was just thrilled to digest this new content. Here are just a few takeaways from my latest lesson:

The right attitudes precede opportunity. In April, I was living this out in a negative way. My attitude wasn’t in line with seeing opportunities that were all around me. Since I couldn’t see them, I couldn’t seize them. As soon as I turned my attitude around, the opportunities started to appear.

Opportunities are a result of pluck, not luck. George Bernard Shaw said, “The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them.” When we have the right attitude, we are out looking to pluck opportunities wherever we see them. If we have a possibilist mindset, we begin seeing opportunities where others see problems. Similar to seeing the type of car we just bought all over town, we start seeing opportunities everywhere.

Motivation always comes before opportunity. B.C. Forbes said, “Mediocre men wait for opportunities to come to them. Strong, able, alert men go after them.” If you want to live with an opportunity mindset, you need to continually feed your motivation. Determine what or who you need to spend time with to keep the fire going. For me, it has been my Maxwell Leadership mastermind group over the last few weeks. We meet every other Thursday for an hour. We start by sharing successes and then ask for help with the challenges we are facing. It is one of the fastest hours of my week, and when I log off the Zoom meeting, I am pumped up and ready to go.

If you would like to hear about the other essentials of opportunity, please join Marisa Norcross and me for Episode 258 of The Next Page podcast as we look to make the most of the opportunities that are all around us.

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